Dream Team builder: Greg Broughton

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AFL FANTASY DREAM TEAM: The ex-Docker has great scoring potential, if he can stay on the park...

2013 position: Defender/forward2013 price: $408,000

Bye: Round 13

Last year's average: 79.2Last year's high score: 109

Four reasons to have him in your team

1) Because you love the pain. Broughton is one of those infuriating players who Dream Teamers will swear off every season, only to draft in him again the following year because he's got boatloads of promise. He's the perennial pre-season bolter, and he's already carving up the track at the Suns. At $408,000 and with a new home and coach, the former Fremantle defender is going to be too attractive a proposition to refuse, even for those he has burned before.

2) Word out of the Suns is that Bluey McKenna plans to use Broughton off the half-back line and as a switch-hitting midfielder. The latter should do the world of good for his scores. Broughton was priced at $416,200 to begin 2012, but dived to $326,000 with a 79.2 average and a high score of 109 (one of only three tons in 15 games) as Ross Lyon played funny buggers with his role. Historically, Broughton scores best either running off half-back or as a midfielder; he had a glut of high scores after Mark Harvey tossed him into the engine room to cover injuries in late 2011. Hopefully McKenna has the good sense to do the same.

3) He's a dual position player and a rare-ish one at that. You don't see too many defender/forwards floating around, and few with the scoring potential that Broughton has. He could come in handy when the byes hit in rounds 11 and 12. The Suns play St Kilda and North Melbourne across that fortnight and Broughton in particular seems to shine against the Saints, averaging 89.25 with a high score of 122.

4) We hear it every year, but he oozes the potential for big scores. Back to that scoring glut in 2011: In 10 games from rounds nine to 19 Broughton averaged 106.5 with high scores of 149 and 139. Admittedly, he went on to tally 57, 71, 51, 62 and 89 in the last five games of the year. This is the problem. He's got an incredible upside matched only by his propensity for making junk scores the following week. Similarly, he averaged 92.7 for a nine-game streak from rounds three to 11 last season, and just as everybody traded him in he went 57, 75, 59 and 36 and copped a season-ending finger injury.

The downside?

Not much attention is given to the fact that Broughton is injury-prone. He played just 15 games in each of his first two seasons, played through injury in 2011 (due to the crisis on Fremantle's list) and missed a chunk of last season too. That's something to consider.

And not to beat a dead horse, but the man is seriously prone to inconsistent scoring. He could burst out of the blocks with a few hundreds in the Suns' midfield this season, but if McKenna decides to try him out as a lock-down defender then forget it Jake, it's Greg Broughton.

Risk rating: Just resign yourself to the fact that you're going to ride the Greg Broughton rollercoaster again this year, and when he burns you you're going to hate yourself. Three Alan Didaks.

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